American woman is first to suffer an eye worm infestation previously only seen in cattle

ABBY BECKLEY had been working on a salmon fishing boat in Alaska when her eye became irritated and she began suffering from a migraine. After five days she returned to port where she used a mirror to examine her eye. Instead of an errant eyelash she pulled out a tiny, translucent worm.

“I looked at it, and it was moving,” she told CNN. “And then it died within about five seconds.”

Ms Beckley didn’t know it, but she had made medical history. American scientists revealed she had become the first person in the world to suffer an eye infestation of a worm species previously seen only in cattle. It is spread by flies which feed on eyeball lubrication. Scientists at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said 14 translucent parasitic worms of the species Thelazia gulosa, all less than half an inch (1.27cm) long, were extracted from the 26-year-old’s eye over a 20-day period, before her symptoms dissipated. “This case turned out to be a species of the Thelazia that had never been reported in humans,” said Richard Bradbury, the study’s lead author, who works with the CDC’S Division of Parasitic Diseases and Malaria. This species of worm was previously seen in cattle throughout the northern US and southern Canada, the researchers reported in a study published in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. They said it indicates that North Americans may be more vulnerable than previously understood to such infections.